Bandwagon theory, clarified

A good friend of mine has requested that I answer for my apparent hypocrisy in decrying fair-weather fans while calling for Carlos Boozer to be traded.

I'm going to try and explain it by expanding on my "being a fan is like being a parent" analogy.

If the team represents the child, then in my opinion, unskilled and overpaid players are like problems the child goes through. As a Jazz fan, Greg Ostertag was like your bright and talented teenager skipping class and not ever studying. If you're a Blazers fan, Darius Miles is like your kid always talking back and not respecting authority.

Do these things make you turn on the kid? Kick him out of the house? Adopt a new child?

Nope.

You work with the child to help them get over these undesirable traits. And if your team has players who are weighing the team down, eventually it gets to the point that they need to be let go. I have no loyalty to the specific players who wear a Jazz uniform. If I did, I'd still be a Deshawn Stevenson fan.

That said, I will never boo a Jazz player. Watching Boozer makes me disappointed and sad, not spiteful. I'd love to see him succeed. I'd like to watch him learn how to play defense. But at this point it's clear that's not going to happen. The Jazz can't afford to have him and Okur play underneath. And in my judgment, Okur is more valuable to the team.

So that's it. My loyalty is to the team, not the players. Hope that clears things up.

One more note about last night

After reviewing the box score from Game 5, one thing sticks out at me.

Deron shot eight free throws, which ties his playoff high. For as aggressive as he was last night, that's incredible. Deron spent a lot of time driving to the hoop and getting hit. Unfortunately, because he doesn't fall down every time he attempts a layup (Tony Parker), he can't get the whistles.

Thanks for ruining it for the rest of the league, the Spurs.

Has flopping really become so entrenched in the NBA that if a player doesn't fall down he doesn't get the call?

I can barely talk about this game

My brain is completely fried at how completely and utterly frustrated I am about the game tonight. It was horrible on so many levels I'm still trying to figure it all out.

First off, the Jazz played like girls over the last five or six minutes. Boozer and Okur were absolutely horrendous on both ends of the floor. The Lakers' final few buckets were eeeeeasssy dunks or layups. I've come to accept that Okur and Boozer are quite possibly the worst defensive frontcourt in the NBA. Please convince me I'm wrong.

But when you combine that with no offense from either of those guys in the fourth quarter, and you might as well play Michael Jackson at the four and Shia LaBeouf at the five. Why Sloan didn't insert Millsap or even Collins I'll never know. I've been hard on Jarron for a long time, but at least he tries on defense.

Watching our two All-Star big guys in the final quarter was torture.

And while I'm complaining about who gets playing time, why can't Brewer see the floor late in games? Korver has been beyond bad this postseason, hitting somewhere around 28% of his 3-pointers. Tonight he was 1-3, so he improved, but still. He didn't do a thing for Utah in the fourth quarter. Put Brewer in and see if he can do any better.

The other half of my frustration was the officiating. I'll freely admit the Jazz didn't deserve the win tonight, but the refereeing was the worst I have seen in a long, long time.

The play where Gasol bowled Matt Harpring over for a layup in the fourth quarter? That was as clear a charge as you'll ever see on any level of basketball. Harpring was there, and set well outside the circle, for a good second and a half to two seconds before Gasol got there. It is one of the few legitimate charges Harp has ever taken, and he didn't get the whistle. That was so bad, it was "send the tape the NBA and the ref gets suspended" bad.

Then you have the phantom whistle against Boozer as Odom got free off a screen for the dunk (see: horrible defense in the fourth quarter). Boozer was trailing Odom, beaten in every sense of the word, and had essentially given up on the play. And then the refs called a foul. Are you kidding me? Boozer was close enough to maybe nick Odom with his fingernail.

Then there's the series where Deron took the ball down the lane for a layup and got whacked on the arm. No call. Farmar does the same thing going the other way, foul on Deron.

Then there's the play where Vujacic dribbled the ball off his own foot while being pressured by AK. The ref right on top of the play called it out of bounds, Jazz ball. The ref clear across the court overrules him and calls Andrei for the foul. How is that ever okay in the NBA?

I've been resisting the "Stern wants a Lakers/Celtics Finals" conspiracy stuff. But when we are watching the gold versus the green in June, I'll be sure to throw a brick through Commissioner Stern's front window.

Because it's coming.

Oh, and the Trade Boozer Parade is back on schedule. Non-existent defense + 5 of 15 shooting when it mattered = trade the man.

I'm throwing my support behind a presidential candidate

I've made it clear that my favorite presidential candidate for 2008 was Mitt Romney.

And since he withdrew his candidacy in February, I've struggled to find someone to support. McCain excites me in no way. Obama is a charismatic socialist. Hillary is flat-out insane with her desire to get more power.

So when this candidate declared his intention to run, I looked over his platform and immediately recognized this was someone I could gain guidance from.


Now, I know what you're thinking. How can a mythical aquatic reptilian creature lead our nation? You are showing your bias, friend. There's nothing in the Constitution that precludes a mythical sea-beast from being president.

Now that that's out of the way, here is evidence of Liopleurodon's leadership in action.




I encourage all disaffected voters everywhere to throw their support behind Liopleurodon. It is out best chance for success as a nation.

Vader attack

In short, two brothers who love Star Wars established the Church of Jediism in Wales sometime in 2007. At least some of the inspiration for this idea came from the phenomenon of people specifying "Jedi" as their religion during the worldwide 2001 census. In England/Wales alone, over 300,000 people stated their religion was Jedi.

But tragically, when Welsh brothers Barney and Michael Jones founded the Church of Jediism, they underestimated the threat of the dark side of the Force.

Last month, a man claiming to be Darth Vader attacked the founders of Jediism during a training session in their backyard. Using a metal crutch, the Dark Lord of the Sith bruised one of the brothers on the leg and thwacked the other on the head.

Fortuitously, we have a video record of this attack. Hopefully it will help teach Jedi everywhere to be ever-vigilant of attack.

What an odd series

I must admit, Game 4 was the first of the Celtics/Cavs series games I really paid attention to.

Bottom line, LeBron is still horrible from the outside, but not as horrible as he was in Games 1-3. At least the kid hit two clutch 3-pointers tonight.

But the real surprising issue here is that, at least in Cleveland, LeBron's supporting cast is better than KG's. Paul Pierce and Ray Allen were far from stars, while the combined effort of Wally, Big Z, Gibson and Varejao was good for 49 points, over half of the Cavs' final score of 88. LeBron was finding guys like he usually does (13 assists), and they were hitting their shots. Can't ask for more.

The Celtics look pretty bad right now. Then again, Boston doesn't need to win a single road playoff game to take the championship. That's what homecourt does for you.

Paying attention, Jazz?

Anyway, I didn't make a prediction for this series. This is partly because they played Game 1 before I got around to looking at the matchups, and partly because I couldn't quite make up my mind. On the one hand, the Boston Threeparty weren't that impressive against Atlanta.



On the other hand, Cleveland still looked like LeBron and the 10 Stooges against Washington.

Obviously, my second observation has changed, while the first one remains the same.

That said, at this point the series is a best-of-three, and Boston has homecourt. I'm going to call it for the Celtics in seven.

But no one thought the Cavs would get through Detroit last year, either. So I'm fully prepared to be dead wrong. LeBron is LeBron. Even if he's ice cold from the field, he still finds a way to win.

Should be fun to watch either way.

Officiating

Adam Hoff, writer for Section F Sports, became a Jazz fan for the day after the horrible officiating in Jazz/Lakers Game 4.

The Utah Jazz pulled out a 123-115 overtime victory over the Lakers today and for that I can only say, thank goodness, because they nearly got screwed worse than any team this postseason.

[F]or most of the game, the refs were fine. Then, they collectively lost their minds with four of the worst calls I've seen this postseason. All of which came in an 8-minute stretch from the close of regulation through overtime. And all four went against the home team.

Good to see an unbiased third party thinks the Jazz get the short end of the stick once in a while. At home. Four times in a row during a crucial stretch in a playoff game.

Anyway, read the post. It's good.